jugular
nounEtymology Late 16th century borrowing from Late Latin jugulāris, from jugulum (“the collarbone; the hollow part of the neck above the collarbone; the throat”) + -āris (“-ar, -ary”, adjectival suffix); equivalent to jugulum + -ar.
2
Broadly, In plural, Rare Any critical vulnerability.
- It was vicious; he went for the jugular.
- One of Lionel's old Salthill friends with whom he exchanged perhaps a dozen words a year, and with whom he sometimes played squash, and tennis, both men killers on the court, seeking the jugular […].2001, Joyce Carol Oates, Middle Age: A Romance, paperback edition, Fourth Estate, page 83:
- Derived terms
- go for the jugular